


Reconnection

by threading_in_dreams



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: I just like letters, closure of a sort, this might be sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-27
Updated: 2019-07-27
Packaged: 2020-07-20 15:56:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19994848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/threading_in_dreams/pseuds/threading_in_dreams
Summary: Tiny fic. The Doctor finds an unsent message and decides she might as well send it.I always thought Clara needed a bit of closure.





	Reconnection

The Doctor had dropped off the gang (team? fam? She still couldn't decide.) in Sheffield so they could, on Ryan's words, "Have a normal one" and also catch up on their regular lives. She had always been secretly worried that her friends would rejoin their human lives and forget about her, but in this newest regeneration the feelings were somewhat stronger. So much, that the Doctor was starting to worry that her social awkwardness was, this time, full blown social anxiety, a thought that itself was giving her anxiety, which was just no good and actually really bad.  
And that was why she decided to recalibrate the Tardis.  
There was no actual need for it, of course, or more like there is no guarantee the Tardis won't undo any calibration she manages in the very next flight. But the Doctor still hasn't got the knack for the new navigation controls, it's like the old lady put everything on shuffle, and messing about would help tremendously with actually finding out where the controls are. Plus, calibration is just soothing. Something about the repetitive task, the humming noises the Tardis makes and the focus required to discern the right noises from the wrong ones and the Very Wrong ones made her go almost into a trance. Which is why she has no idea how she ended up staring at a tesseract draft while looking for the artron energy balance levels historical graphs, but there she was and that single unsent message glared at her from the screen. She vaguely remembered composing it when she was a cross scotsman, right before regenerating. It was sort of a bittersweet memory and a foggy one at that. Reading it was like opening someone else's mail.  


"You wanted to remind me of this for some reason?" She said aloud, either to herself of to the Tardis, she wasn't very sure which. "It's not like I could send it. It was for Clara and she is--- Well, I wish I could send it, I wish there was some address I could send her this last goodbye before it was too late for goodbyes, even if it is already too late for that, but--- Oh." The idea crept into her mind slowly and tantalizing. "Only it's not about now, is it? Not so much where as when and possibly how."  
She carefully toggled switches and pulled levers, checking the readings every once in a while. Once she verified it was almost possible, just missing something, it was just a mad dash to Clara's old room (she was proud to only take the wrong turn twice), where she retrieved a forgotten denim jacket. Draping the jacket on the Tardis' telepathic controls, she tried again.  
"Clara, Clara, when could you be?". She asked as the Tardis worked to divine a time address and location from the leftover telepathic impressions in the jacket. If she was right, and she might as well be because she is very clever, the Tardis could pull a future memory out of the impressions, say from today's date, and that memory would contain a time address. Or it should.  
After a while, a result was shown, which was much more than the Doctor expected. "Are you sure? Not pulling my leg on this one?", she asked the Tardis, which responded with a series of bleeps that sounded positively rude.  
"I know you never really liked her, but there is no call for that." The Doctor said, entering the time address into the tesseract's equivalent of a 'to' field.  
"Well, there goes nothing." She said as the message was sent. She was only slightly surprised to notice the jacket was gone as well.

Clara was sleeping. Past tense, since she had been rudely awakened by a blaring alarm, the tone of which gave no indication of what kind of emergency was at hand. She had pulled on a coat and made her way to the Tardis' controls before she was actually fully awake. Such were the instincts of one who used to travel with the Doctor. But she wasn't with him now, was she? Whatever was happening, she'd have to figure it out herself. She muted the alarm and stared at the readings. Proximity, more precisely the doors, more precisely this is the bloody doorbell again. 

One of the first things Clara noticed was that when you're piloting a Tardis that is stuck in the shape of a 50's diner there is a greater chance someone will knock on the door than if said Tardis is in some other shape, say a blue box. So you must excuse her for not getting all worked up with the reading. People couldn't help seeing a diner with a closed sign, they had to ring the doorbell and ask if maybe they could come in for a quick coffee. People, regardless of species, were generally very attached to their coffee habits. The promise of pie probably helped as well.

She was ready to go back to sleep and let whoever was hovering at the door decide for themselves that there would be no coffee from this place when she chanced a glance at the readings and realised the sensor wasn't actually showing human life signs. Not that it would make sense to find any kind of life signs, considering, now that she thought about it, that they were parked in some planet's moon, which had showed no sign of life or current civilization whatsoever to this moment (it did have some impressive ruins).

Snapping out of her sleepiness, she gave a more thorough check to the readings. There were no actual life signs of any kind. Whatever was out there, managed to move around and knock on doors without being alive. That left a whole lot of possibilities a slate of impossibilities. It also made her madly curious, and she wasn't in the mood to be prudent.  
Clara made her way to the door and paused for a second before opening. Well, it's not like anything could kill her, she thought, throwing open the door in a dramatic move which was hampered by the fact that her head was immediately covered by a black denim jacket, which made her scream and got Me running over before she could either close the door or remove the jacket from her face.

"What the hell?" Me said, after checking around the door for hidden enemies.  
"I have no idea, I just opened the door and this coat attacked me." Clara said, looking at the jacket she was now holding. "Wait. This is my jacket."  
"Then you shouldn't keep it on the door to be blown into your face. But how did that happened? It's not like there is any wind here, not in this atmosphere."  
"No, you don't understand. This jacket is mine, it was in my room. In the Doctor's Tardis."  
"So, you think he's got his memory back and is sending you your stuff in the weirdest possible way?" Me said, picking up the jacket from Clara's arms and going through its pockets.  
"That would be the Doctor, yes, but I don't think this is what happened."  
"There is something here." Me said, producing a luminous white cube from pocket. Freed from the pocket, the hypercube flew a circuit around Clara, then stopped in front of her, floating mid-air. It was hard to look at it, like it had more dimensions inside of it than it should be possible, like it was a cube made of a bigger cube that was forced into it in the wrong angle. Once she managed to fix her vision on the object, she noticed it had gallifreyan writing on its face, non-translated of course, but familiar. Clara felt a compelling need to touch it, it was like a whisper in the back of her mind that said go on, it's not going to hurt you, just do it.  
"Be careful!" Me said, circling around to stand beside Clara. The hypercube seemed somehow to be waiting.  
"It's like it's calling to me." Clara said, reaching out to touch it. And then she was nowhere. 

All around Clara was a vast empty white space. Or maybe a small white space, she couldn't really tell. She looked at herself and was relieved to still have a body, so she walked forward, pretending the whiteness beneath her feet was just floor. As she walked, the contours of the world started taking a familiar shape. A Tardis. The Doctor's Tardis, actually, and exactly as she had last seen it. She touched the console, still warm from travel, and let her hands slide over the too-familiar controls, her eyes swelling up with tears. It was all slightly unreal, too perfect a recollection, too still, like a photograph taken from time. A memory, complete in all senses, and missing in just one thing. The sound of chalk on a blackboard made her turn, her heart racing. And there he was. Her Doctor, absently writing on the blackboard. 

"Doctor?" She said, approaching. "Is it you or am I just having the most accurate definition of a guilt-trip ever?"  
He did not seem to hear her. She was ready to ask again, reach out and grab his shoulder, demand answers, when she looked at what he was writing. And then she started crying softly.

> Dearest Clara
> 
> You asked me about regeneration and I never answered because it's too personal, too intimate, too much of myself. Now that you are gone and another regeneration approaches I wonder if I should have shared this with you, because I wish I had given you more of myself, or at least different parts of myself. I keep thinking that if I had talked to you about my uncertainties, you wouldn't assume I'm always certain, wouldn't have taken that chance that took your life and maybe I would still have you as more than a memory.  
>  But I should know better than to question maybes. There are too many of them and if I ever get started I might never finish. Until I end, that is.

The Doctor paused and seemed to stare at his hand holding the chalk. A bright yellow energy - regeneration energy, Clara knew as much - flared about, encompassing his hand. He closed his eyes, maybe trying to concentrate, and the energy receded. He resumed writing.

> And right now I'm ending.  
>  That's how I know it's close. Even before the rest of me changes, my mind changes. I lose myself, start to fade into a memory. I become a person that remembers when the Doctor was me, but doesn't know who they are beyond that. It feels like death, and I always grieve that person, the one I have to let go of when I change.  
>  You know, back in Gallifrey they have counselling for regeneration. Don't act surprised, grief is grief and some people are better at processing it than others. I've never had the experience, but from what I've been told it's like regular grief counselling, only for yourself. I wonder if it involves scrapbooking or writing poetry. I could never write poetry about myself, it's sort of a dick move.

He stops and looks at his last sentence, frowning, re-reading it before continuing.

> Did you see that? I'm already losing my words, my line of thought. And it seems new me has a whole new vocabulary.  
>  But I was trying to explain how I feel. And I'm starting to feel incredible again.  
>  The regeneration process is also rebirth, and like all births it's confusing, upsetting, disorientating and exhilarating all at once. Like anything is possible, like I'm catching fire, like this is the only moment in existence.  
>  The feeling sticks for a while after I've changed, so that on a regular first day I'm about as surprised as anyone else with every single action I take, every word I choose. It's close enough to self-doubt that I hate it, but I also love it so much. I'm a stranger to myself, still finding out what kind of person I am, and that fills me with so much wonder and joy. That is probably the one chance I have of understanding how people take in meeting me, too bad I'm always too high on regeneration energy for self-reflection and know too many of myself to actually be surprised by anything I do. I'd enjoy being surprised. Surprises are good. Unless the surprise is something that wants to kill you, in which case they aren't. But generally I don't surprise myself, I just do what feels right.

He pauses again, the regeneration energy seems to pulse through his body, he resists it.

> This is goodbye, I guess. I wanted to say goodbye to you, because you were the first face this face saw. The first to see me, the one that stuck around when I most needed it. My dearest companion, my only family for so long. I will always remember our time, the fun and the not-so-fun. I will always remember how you brave you were, how kind and how this best part of you also got you killed. It shouldn't have. I failed you in my duty of care, but you must remember that you have never failed me. Wherever you are, whatever you do, please remember that. And live.  
>  I can feel it getting closer now. I need to take a breath. I don't think I can keep writing this right now.  
>  Not that it makes sense to write, because even if you are still out there between heartbeats, I don't think I have the means or the time to send this.  
>  I'll just take a breath.

He steps away from the blackboard, staggering a bit, and Clara chases his image as it fades, the tears flowing freely from her eyes. Is he gone now? Is that it? Just goodbye? Clara approaches the blackboard as the words are erased and a new message is written. This time it's not his handwriting, it's similar, but if possible sloppier. Like the words are running into each other.

> Oh, hello! The Doctor here. The new one, at least. I found this message while messing about in the Tardis (or maybe she showed it to me, I'm not very clear). I have no idea what switch I flicked that prompted me this draft, but there you go, that's how things are for me right now.  
>  It's so eerie to find words you remember writing on another life, like being haunted by yourself (but aren't we all?), yet it's good to think you will receive them. Well you should receive them if everything goes right.  
>  What else can I say? I have my new face on, and it's a pretty good one actually. I get to be a woman, that's rare for me. Also, I think you'd like to know that I got my memory back. It's a long story, actually, but that's why you were on my mind when I was regenerating. I missed you, impossible girl. I still do, but maybe it would be awkward to see you now. New face and all. But I wish I could. No telling when or where this message will reach you, but please make space in your schedule for a visit from an old friend. Just ping me at the hypercube's address if you think it's a good idea.
> 
> Your friend for all of space and time,  
>  The Doctor

When Clara noticed, she was kneeling on the floor of the Tardis. Her Tardis (well, it was hers now, she stole it after all). Touching her face she could see the tears were real, even if everything else had been something else. Dream? Hallucination? Psychic message? The hypercube was still now, lying dormant in her hands and giving off only the slightest glow.  
Me knelt down in front of her, betraying just the tiniest bit of worry in her frown.  
"Clara? You were out for a second there, is everything alright?"  
"It's fine, I'm fine, it was some sort of psychic message." She said, wiping her tears. "The Doctor remembered."  
"Oh. And what did he say?"  
"He said goodbye."


End file.
